The Ministry of Health, on Sunday, announced the extension of the State of Public Health Emergency declared in Maldives due to the COVID-19 pandemic, until May 4.
Health Minister Ahmed Naseem stated that this extension was based on the advice given by the Director-General of Public Health Maimoona Aboobakuru, who highlighted that there still remains a severe threat of a national outbreak. Hence, Maldives need to take preventive measures.
Maldives declared its first-ever state of public health emergency on March 12, under Section 33 of the 7/2012 Public Health Act, over the COVID-19 pandemic for a period of 30 days.
It has been extended multiple times since then.
The country recently recorded a spike in COVID-19 cases, which has been increasing throughout the year, with several clusters found in capital Male’ as well as some southern islands and operational resorts.
Currently, the island nation records a total of 24,783 virus cases of which 3,061 are active cases, in addition to 21,646 recoveries and 67 deaths.